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Careful preparation needed before pregnancy
Being pregnant is not a competition and it should not be rushed after marriage. Couples should understand all the necessary preparations needed before conception and before the baby’s birth. Eventually, prepared pregnancies contribute to a nation’s development of high-quality human resources.
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Being pregnant is not a competition and it should not be rushed after marriage. Couples should understand all the necessary preparations needed before conception and before the baby’s birth. Eventually, prepared pregnancies contribute to a nation’s development of high-quality human resources. (JP/-)
I
n Indonesia, we face the unspoken culture that being pregnant for women is a duty to be accomplished after marriage as if the marriage is incomplete without babies delivered after the wedding. Pregnancies are used as an instrument to measure a couple’s happiness, and our society commands that the newlyweds should not wait to put a bun in the oven. Such pressure usually comes from the family, particularly parents, friends or even the woman’s own partner. Families are desperate to continue their lineage, while couples believe that a baby can strengthen their marriage.
In fact, being pregnant is not as simple as people think. Pregnancy is a condition that brings complex disruptions to a woman’s body. Fluctuating hormones change one’s physiology and provoke imbalances in the body’s chemistry. Being pregnant puts every woman in danger and, bluntly said, closer to death. One complication is the increase of amniotic fluids inside the womb.
Unfortunately, more fluids will make the mother’s heart beat faster. It can lead to hypertension, which, if not treated properly, can cause other organs to release toxic metabolites, raising the risk of seizures. This condition is called eclampsia and is one of the highest causes of maternal mortality.
Mental health is another rising issue among pregnant women, particularly those who are unprepared to face their pregnancy. Symptoms of depression, anxiety or even hallucinations can develop during pregnancy or postdelivery. Furthermore, they can lower both the mother’s quality of life and that of their newborn baby.
The pregnant woman needs to fulfill the intake of herself and the baby, but most people wrongly assume they need to take twice as much food portion. The actual concept is they should reach their nutrition target. Most of the nutrition cannot be completed only by daily meals, so the pregnant woman need to get prescriptions for additional supplementation.
To ensure a healthy pregnancy, supplements should be taken. Therefore, couples who wish to have a baby directly after marriage need to meet their physician to ask about which supplements they should take. One necessary supplement prior to conception is folic acid, which should be consumed three months before the beginning of the pregnancy to avoid defects in the baby’s neural tube and ensure that the baby’s brain is well developed.
Pregnant women also need other forms of nutritional intake. Basically, they do not need any kind of supplements if their meals are adequate. In fact, most Indonesian mothers do not have a proper basal diet as they tend to choose foods that make them stay full instead of food that fulfills their nutritional needs.
